Spring Toy Fair 2010 thoughts. Mattel.

There will be no pics in this particular blog. I like to only include my own pics, but I'll link to the figures I'm referring to so you can get a look.

Mattel (WWE)
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The big news from the Toy Fair is that Mattel are introducing a new line called "WWE Legends". The packaging uses the WWE Legends logo (similar to the old block style WWF logo). The figures will be in elite style.

The first series consists of; Ricky "The Dragon" Steamboat, Sgt. Slaughter, "Stone Cold" Steve Austin, "The American Dream" Dusty Rhodes, "Road Warrior" Animal & "Road Warrior Hawk.

The second series; Terry Funk, Iron Sheik, "Ravishing" Rick Rude, "Superfly" Jimmy Snuka & Jake "The Snake" Roberts. It's also safe to assume that one more figure will be in this set that hasn't been announced yet (as the vast majority of figure series, including the first series of Legends, contains six figures.)

I think it's a smart move for Mattel to produce a line like this. It was clearly the line that "made" Jakks. Mattel now has a wide range of body molds (even though they're still making new ones for people like Dusty Rhodes and Sgt. Slaughter) so it shouldn't be too difficult to re-create certain wrestlers' likeness.

The only critisism I have is that they didn't get a Bret Hart figure on show. Just think of the possibilites they could have done;

Elite Series- Current style, with either short or regular length jeans, sculpted t-shirt (not cloth), and a removeable leather jacket.
Basic Series- Similar to the elite but obviously with less articulation and no jacket.
Entrance Greats- Choose from a vast array of attires with entrance jacket and removeable shades. Maybe base it off one of the times he took the Canadian flag to the ring so there's another accessory in the box.
Legends- Any era of Bret for this.

Obviously they still have time to make a Bret figure, but how cool would it have been to see something (even if it was an unpainted prototype) just so we know we're getting something.

Check back soon for thoughts on the product that Jakks showed.

Didn't do the reviews.... meh.

Basically, I've got all the reviews written out and have a few images on my digital camera but am not home (which is where my camera is). So there's no way of me uploading them and putting them with the review.

The look back on ECW with some of the Mattel figures should be up on Thursday, it's literally a case of uploading the images.

My indepth review of Basic Series 2 Jack Swagger will follow shortly after the look-back on ECW. It just needs a final read-through (and images uploading.)

Check back here in an hour or two when I'll have some thoughts on the 2010 Spring Toy Fair.

New reviews coming soon

I think from now on I'm going to do "themed" reviews (unless I get something super cool). By this, I mean I'm going to do reviews based on the goings on in wrestling/MMA. Or a possible future review may be the 5 worst figures I own. I think reviews like that are more interesting than just a random review of one figure.

So the first themed review is going to be titled "RIP WWECW". The review will either be a series of separate reviews of the following figures, or all of them in one blog post. I like to get the reviews done on a Thursday (Friday at the latest) so I have the weekend to do other things. But I'm expecting Series 2 of Mattel's basic figures (minus Rey Mysterio and Vladimir Kozlov) to arrive any day now. And that series contains some figures I'd like to include in my tribute to WWECW.
The following figures will be included in the review:
Basic Series 1 Kofi Kingston
Basic Series 1 Evan Bourne
Basic Series 1 The Big Show
Basic Series 2 CM Punk
Basic Series 2 Jack Swagger (This one may get a review to itself as he's one of my favourite wrestlers)
Basic Series 2 Mark Henry
Basic Series 2 Kane
Elite Series 2 Matt Hardy
2-Packs Series 2 Miz & Morrisson
2-Packs Series 2 Finlay & Hornswoggle

I realise that is quite a lot of figures to review so it may not be as in depth as my previous reviews, but I'll take a fair amount of images to make up for it. The images for these reviews will be better than my last two. As I'm going to use my digital camera to get some good shots.

Other future reviews will be include; "Triple H vs Randy Orton", "Entrance Greats: Shawn Michaels", "My top 10 Jakks WWE figures", "UFC Octagon Playset". Also look out for random figure reviews of figures that I have received but haven't had time to review like, Elite Series 2 Batista and Elite Series 2 R-Truth.

UFC Series 1 Mike "Quick" Swick Review

UFC 109 is right around the corner, Mike Swick is the only fighter on the card that I have a figure of. So I've decided to do a review on him. I'm expecting to be receiving the full set of six WWE Elite series 2 figures and an Entrance Greats Shawn Michaels. I'll deffinatley be doing a review of HBK once I get him. But I won't have time to fully review all six (Randy Orton, Ted DiBiase, Triple H, Matt Hardy, Batista and R-Truth.) So I'll do reviews eventually on Elite series 2 Orton and Matt Hardy deffinatley, but these reviews will probably come in a week when I have no new figures. So, the review... Let's get it on!


Packaging
I bought this figure loose, but the figure is packaged in a standard Jakks UFC figure box. It has the UFC event logo the figure is based from (UFC Fight For The Troops.) And it also says it is from the UFC collection (the Jakks UFC line also includes Legends, Pride and WEC.)

Printed on the carding behind the figure is a chainlink fence with UFC protective pads, to show that this is from the UFC line. The Pride figures have ring ropes to show that the fighter was a Pride fighter.

Head Scan/Part Sculpt

The head scan has a great likeness to him. The part scuplt is what lets this figure down. At the Fight for the Troops card, Swick was fighting at Welterweight which is the 170lb division. But he shares the exact same torso as Miguel "Angel" Torres (from the WEC part of Jakks UFC line.) Torres' figure is based from the time he was Bantamweight champion which is the 135lb division. Even though there is a 35lb weight difference, both figures have the same torso.

This is a problem with the UFC line, in three series (Series 0, 1 and 2) Jakks has only used three different torsos. All the heavyweights (Lesnar, Mir, Nogueira etc) share the same torso, then there is the torso mainly used for the Lightheavyweights, and finally the torso that has been used for anyone smaller than Lightheavyweight.

Articulation

The figure has Jakks Deluxe articulation which means; Ball-joint neck, ball-joint shoulders, single-hinged elbows, swivel and up and down wrist movement, swivel-waist, ball-joint wait, double-hinged knee and swivel and up and down ankle movement.

The figures also have additional articulation in the shoulder area, it allows the arms to move across the chest for more accurate submission and grappling.

Paint

I couldn't find an image of his attire from Fight for the Troops so I can only go on how the logos are applied. Everything looks to be in place and applied straight with no half-applied logos. The red tape around the glove is a nice touch as the earlier series didn't have this.

Accessories
Swick comes with no accessories. It would have been nice to get a water bottle or possibly walk on t-shirt.


Comparison/Scale